Dead-end Dreams

There is a twilight

Where dreams end

And realities begin.

To some, it is dawn,

Wake-up time;

Dusk it is, to others.

To those who slept through

Dawn,

Dusk

Is the time

To light candles

In Wake.

************** Balachandran, Strike Day II, 25-09.2008

Bathroom Babel

My bathroom is a secure place

With a little window to the world.

A two-way window, to look out

And to look within.

Water runs, chuckling,

Washing away dirt; sins too.

The resident spider sprints

With a cockroach in its mouth.

A gecko peers, scrambling

As I sprinkle a little water at him.

A stage

To enact my fantasies

To practice a speech

To sing a song

To talk to my love

Or imagine making love.

Outside, a spider squats in its web

A cocoon hangs from a leaf

A Koel sings, a Kingfisher shrugs

A crow cleans its beak

And a squirrel hops up the tree.

Farther, the world waits –

Sharpening its claws

Cracking its knuckles

Gnashing its teeth –

The world waits for me.

I hide in my bathroom

Comforted by its damp coziness

Peering out at the world

Bracing to be eaten alive.

A buffer zone, a barrier

Between banalities and bitter realities

The bathroom determines

What I am, what I like to be;

And what I do not want to be.

**************** Balachandran V, Trivandrum 04.09.2008